Unknown times
by Espalia
Summary: As the game sessions fail in Alternia, two trolls find themselves in a desperate situation. Being separated from their moirails for so long has led them to the brink of madness. They just need some time.
1. Jade fury

Screens, chairs, desks, tables, eels, shoes, anything in the room that could be thrown was thrown. With Kratai in there, that meant even walls could fly.

Everyone had small forts built with piles of cables. Everyone threw what they had near their hands. It was like a snowball fight…but without snow…and with equipment that weighted half a ton flying in the air. Everyone had fun; everyone went nuts, everyone but the grumpy-jade-blood leader of the group.

Hatless and wearing a completely black shirt and only one shoe, he stood in the middle of the room cursing and swearing.

"You bunch of idiots I can't believe you are so fucking retarded stop throwing and ripping things off the walls the meteor will fall apart for gogs sake STOP IT KRATAI PUT THAT FUCKING WALL DOWN YOU ARE GOING TO – FUCK MYUURA MY HEAD IS NOT A TARGET FOR FUCKS SAKE NOW SOMEONE GIVE ME BACK MY GOGDAMMED HAT BACK KRYPOZ I KNOW YOU HAVE MY SHOE NOW GIVE IT BACK YOU ASSHOLE DON'T YOU – METRYR IS THAT MY SHIRT!? FUCK NO. HOLD IT. DON'T USE IT TO WIPE OFF YOUR FUCKING SLIME WITH –

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK YOOOOOOOOOOOOU!"

His face went bright jade and he stormed out of the room furious while discs flew at his head. He screamed, pushed things around, flipped tables and kicked everything around him while he stumbled through a maze of stairs and hallways. Once he reached a metal door with his sign drawn on it with purple paint, he stopped. Taking a deep breath he then punched the door until he was satisfied. There was a small beep and then the door opened.

As soon as he was in and the door closed behind him he dropped himself on one of the many piles in his room. A pile of robot junk and wires…

"Ugh…that…fucking…HURTS!"

He shoved everything aside, kicked everything out of his way once again and then dropped on the bare floor. He stared at some of the screens and pieces he kept on his room. For a moment he thought of building a robot to beat it up and get his anger out. Flipping a table was easier. Instead he just stayed on the floor.

After a while the speakers all around the meteor turned on and a voice went through the meteor, talking to everyone.

"Everyone brace yourselves! We are going to go through a gigantic dream bubble."

Morgen recognized Ophira's voice and thought of going to talk with her.

"…Krypoz and Myuura will be there…no."

"OH! There also seems to be another meteor around!"

There was silence for a moment before the inter-communicators turned on.

"Wait what!? There's another meteor? That's impossible, we should be the only session in the out here!"

That was Krypoz…or Ofenia; their voices were pretty much the same. Girly.

Before he could hear any more arguing or nonsense he turned off the speakers. Since there were no switches he just threw sharp metal pieces at every speaker until the room was silent. Feeling not safe enough from the outside screech he opened the only window in the room. It led to a platform surrounded by some sort of fence. From there he saw the dream bubble that Ophira was talking about. It was really big, bigger than any other bubble he had seen while in that meteor.

He sat down against a wall and just waited until they crossed the bubble. He was fed up with all the trolls in there and meeting their doomed selves was no relief to him. He wanted his hat back, his shirt with his gogdammed symbol in it and no slime stains, he wanted some time in a pile with his matesprit and no other troll around, and he wanted his fucking shoe back. But he still wanted to go through that bubble. Every time they crossed one he expected to find traces of the old Alternia, remember those good old times when it was just stupid fun and role playing games. He wanted those good old times when he could go to that stupid and sometimes overly stoned purple-blooded troll whenever he was feeling like he was feeling that day. He looked again at the bubble as the meteor was absorbed by it.


	2. Purple Frenzy

"Amia please I need your help!"

"Not now I don't –"

"PLEASE! They are –"

"Shut up I don't want to deal with them!"

"But…!"

"SHUT THE FUCK UP ZORAIN I'M SICK TIRED OF THEM TOO AND YOU DON'T SEE ME WHINING ABOUT IT ALL THE TIME DO YOU?!"

The bright purple tint of her face gave her anger away. The 6-sweep-old troll looked at her with despair. His eyes became watery as his purplish tears accumulated in the borders of his eyelids. As her furious orange eyes stared at him she felt her heart sinking. Just as him, she was desperate to get away from the other two trolls in their meteor. But she was two years older and could, to some extent, deal with their hornbeast crap. Zorain was just a little troll trapped in hell. A hell with a sick and twisted bitch with no respect for troll life and a lustful perverted troll who seemed to carry buckets all around the place. As she calmed down her face slowly changed to her normal pale lavender color.

"I'm…I…sorr –"

"THERE YOU ARE! MY TWO PURPLE BITCHES!"

Zorain freaked out with her screechy voice and stepped back as the tall and thin violet-blooded troll approached them. Amia just fell how her head got hot again and the purple color returned to her face. She hissed in a low volume as the other troll got closer.

"Calix, go fuck yourself."

"Why don't you let me fuck YOU?! HEEEEEHEHEHEHE!"

She took out a harpoon as she laughed psychotically and pointed it straight as Amia's head. Amia thought of pulling out her scythe and slashing her head to finish everything off but before she could even move a hand, another voice joined the crowd.

"Come on Calix, why do you have to be soooooo mean?"

As he got closer to the circle he looked at Amia and winked. Right then she understood that everything was going to hell.

"Shut your trap Korgi. I don't need you to annoy me now!"

"Annoy you? NEVER! On the contrary, I am going to give you an important lesson on blackroom romance."

"PFFFFTT! Blackroom romance my ass! I am trying to get some fucking bitches here and if you don't want to end up completely fucked up, you better step back."

Zorain, taking advantage of the moment, sneaked out and found a place to hide. Amia did just the same and escaped to an outside platform where she could see everything around. Once there she just dropped on the floor and tried to rest. The void surrounded her and she could go nowhere to escape from that place. She was tired of living the same thing every day, it had been a whole sweep since they started they little meteor trip. After winning the game she just felt as if she had condemned herself to a life of torture and suffering.

The void seemed to be all around her. Some bubbles floated here and there without disturbing the nothingness. One of them, gigantic and shiny, seemed to be approaching her but she didn't even care about it. All she wished for in that moment was to sleep in her recuperacoon, see her lusus again, or at least have some bit of slime to relax. She was exhausted and, as much as she didn't want to admit it, she needed that gogdammed jade-blood dumbass. She sort of…missed him.

All these thoughts crossed her mind at once and kept her from noticing that other meteor that was going right into the same bubble as hers.


	3. A shock of lavender

Amia fell asleep. As she woke inside the bubble she found herself in a thick dark forest. The trees were so close together that they formed barriers all around her and the bushes were so huge she could barely see through them. She began wandering around, hoping that no other trolls were there. The sole idea of finding any of her session partners made her sick. After a few minutes she let out a big sigh and sat down. No Calix, no Korgi, no Zorain. She was alone, lost, and completely clueless in that very dark looking forest that belonged to some other troll she didn't know and that was, probably, very aggressive. What a relief.

She tried to relax and clear her head of all the hornbeast crap that she had been through. The unnecessary game shenanigans, fighting a humongous black king, trying to fulfill useless quests, and getting her hopes up over Calix's several deaths; she was fed up with everything. But as she calmed down and forgot all about the horrendous week, she became aware of her surroundings. She noticed that all around her the trees were scratched or cut, branches were broken and hanged over her head. She rose up to her feet and began looking around carefully. Pieces of blades and arrows with smudged green and gold blood were stuck in the trees and rocks. She was standing in a battlefield. Curiosity took over her. Without thinking it twice, she followed the path of scattered bits and pieces of weapons and color that were left behind by…someone. As she advanced she found chunks of ripped clothes and bigger blood smudges on the trees.

The more she walked the more noises she heard. At first they seemed to be very distant lusii cries; later they became loud screams and voices. The trace began to disappear, but now the voices were leading her. A sudden rush pushed her to run towards the source of the noise. She had no idea what it was, but she felt compelled to get there as soon as possible. Not even once did she stop to ask herself where she was going or if it was a good idea to keep on running. As far as she knew, the trolls there didn't know her and she didn't know them either. They probably outnumbered her and could kill her easily. Nonetheless she kept running until the she found a crowd. Hundreds of trolls. Hundreds.

She hesitated to advance any further when she was faced with a wall of muscles and horns. She slowly and carefully walked among them and mixed in. The trolls didn't seem to care about her presence. They all screamed and cheered.

"YEAH GIVE HIM A GOOD BLOW TO THE HEAD!"

"KICK THAT GOLD BLOODED ASS!"

"I PUT A LOT OF MONEY ON YOU SO YOU BETTER WIN THIS ONE JADE WIMP!"

All the trolls around her were subjugglators. They were cheering for someone. Those were all the clues she needed to understand the situation. Among older subjugglators it was a common practice to buy or trade lowblooded slaves and then put them in an arena. The one who was left alive had the honor to live one more day. The whole thing was a bloody gogdammed carnival just for shit and giggles. Just for the fun of seeing lowbloods beating each other to death.

That was some quality entertainment. When she still lived in Alternia she had always looked up to the subjugglators that could buy their own slaves and put them to fight as they pleased. She wanted to do the same. Too bad the whole planet went kaput before she reached the age to do it.

The excitement of the crowd was contagious; she wanted to see more. Being smaller than everyone there, she looked around hoping to find a high place to climb and see the what was going on. She found it. Pushing her way through the crowd she stomped on some feet. In exchange, the trolls around her hit her with their elbows and hands, some even smacked her with clubs, but none of them seemed to notice there was a strange 7 sweeps-old troll among them. They just kept on screaming and cheering.

"NO IDIOT DON'T FUCK IT UP I BET A LOT ON YOU!"

"HE'S GOING TO LOSE HIS HEAD YES!

"HAHAHA ABOUT TIME! YOU SHOULDN'T HAVE BETTED ON HIM, HE'S USELESS!"

She wanted to see. As soon as she reached higher platform she had spotted she climbed it. Little by little she was able to see everything around her. The arena looked a lot like a coliseum. Every troll looked tiny and their horns seemed to paint the place with an orange tint. In the middle she managed to spot two trolls fighting. One of them had a staff; he was the golden blooded troll they were all cheering for. The other one, as she had assumed, was a jade blood that seemed about to give up and die right there. She squinted and tried to get a better view of both trolls.

"Who knows, it might be someone I hate…" she thought to herself.

But she was interrupted as a hand grabbed her by the hood and pulled her down. She held onto the platform and tried to resist as her hands slipped.

"HEY! Let me go you –"

"What are you doing here?"

The hand pulled her firmly and finally drove her to the ground. She stumbled and tried not to stand on someone's shoes. She looked up and saw the troll that had ruined her entertainment. The troll, who was still holding her arm firmly, wore a black tunic with jade patters on it. His horns popped up through it and his face was covered with a simple black and jade hood. She took a quick look as his face and then tried to get his hand off her arm.

"Look, junk face, I don't – "

"Amia don't talk to me like that."

"What? Who are you? Do I fucking know you, bucked hoarder?"

She once again stared at his face and he slightly pushed his hood back. He seemed to be three times as old as her but he still looked pretty young. His eyes where white and had no shine in them but his face had a greenish bright tint that made him look alive. His face looked familiar. Way too familiar for her liking. It was almost as if it was just a damn coincidence. Her eyes, she thought, were tricking her. It had to be a dream bubble illusion or something of the sort. If that even existed. She tried to open her lips and speak but no words came out. Finally, as she forced the words out, her eyes opened wide.

"M–Morgen?"

He stared back at her and frowned.

"What are you doing here in my memories?"


	4. Unexpected tones of green

He feared he would walk straight into a wall in any moment. It had been a long time, or so it felt, since he had been wandering in that pitch black bubble. There might be a door somewhere, maybe he was in a cage, or maybe he was walking straight into a black hole, who knew. Everything was so dark he was not sure where he was walking to. No one else was there thought, he was sure of that. Not a single troll, dead or alive, had crossed his path. Embracing the nothingness he allowed his mind to space out while he walked and stared at the floor. If there was any floor at all.

His thinking pan went bat shit crazy. All of a sudden the images from his failed session appeared before his eyes and overwhelmed his head. The stupid decisions everyone took during that week weighted over his head and asked "If only you had…" After all, he was the bloody leader of that foolish team.

"I wish I had never played that game. It was all so much fucking better before."

Bullshit.

That stupid game was the best thing that could've happened to him. Back in Alternia he had no future. The only choices he had as a jade blood were to take care of the mother grub or become a highblood's slave. Eventually he would be culled either by fighting to death or because of his uncontrollable mouth. If he had stayed he wouldn't have met any of his friends, if he had stayed his life would be miserable, if he had stayed he wouldn't have met her, Ophira, his matesprit. There was nothing that would make him wish to go back. Absolutely nothing could make him regret that decision…Well…maybe…

"Amia…"

A sudden low humming flowed caught his attention. He lifted his head and found himself in a completely different place. Instead of being surrounded by the void, he was now standing in a fancy and well furnished hallway. A soft and colorful violet carpet covered the floor and an exquisite looking wallpaper with flowery designs and golden curves covered the walls. The humming, which was now slightly louder, filled the hallway in such a way that it was almost impossible to tell where it was coming from.

It sounded familiar. The tune was nothing special though. It was some Alternian rubbish song that he hated. The voice. The voice was what caught his ear.

"Who is it?"

The humming didn't stop. He walked straight ahead as if doing so would get him closer to the source but the volume stayed the same and the hallway seemed to stretch as he walked.

"Who is it? Who is it? Who is it? GOG DAMN IT WHO IS IT!?"

A sudden rush of adrenaline pushed him to run. It was her. It was definitively her! That was her voice and only she would hum that hideous highblood-pride song. She was somewhere in that place. He ran hoping to know where it was coming from. His heart beat increased, his legs burned, and he was running out of air but the low and now vanishing humming seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere. There was no way to tell if it was further away or right in front of him. The hallway was endless and he ran for what seemed to be an eternity. Finally, his legs gave in and he fell to the ground with both hands extended.

"Hahaha! How fucking funny Amia! I know you must be having a blast!" He screamed while trying to catch his breath and got hold of the wall to stand back up with his burning legs. Taking a glance around him he realized his little race had taken him nowhere. The walls and the carpet were exactly the same. He hadn't moved at all from his place. Not even an inch.

"I'm just enjoying myself"

There! He turned around frenetically trying to figure it out.

"Left!"

There was a door. A huge and wide open door. How come he didn't see it before? He smashed his head against the wall before going through it.

"Well you've got your exercise dose of the day."

The air wasn't still quite back in his lungs but he managed to let out a small growl. She was sitting in a corner, holding something that seemed to be a palette and a brush. He dropped on the floor right next to her and tried to recover from that eternal and painful run.

"You are cruel." He mumbled.

"The door was in plain sight. You should look around more often."

Looking up again he got a better look at that stupidly obvious room. Unlike the outer hallway, this one seemed simpler. There was no fancy wallpaper or nice looking carpet. The floor was pitch black and the walls were white. Well, only one wall. The other three were completely painted. The pictures were detailed and delicate, the images just as exquisite as the wallpaper outside but, unlike the golden random patterns in the hallway, those three painted walls told a story. As he examined each one a story seemed to unfold before his eyes but he didn't really know what was going on.

"Don't you recognize anything?"

He turned his head and faced her. It wasn't what he expected. She looked at least five times older than him. Her face still looked young for someone of her blood, but her slim and tall body gave her away. The white color in her eyes didn't diminish her intimidating glare which was enhanced by her gigantic and curly horns. Her black gown, covered with purple details, was slightly stained with other colors.

"Stop it staring at me as if you didn't know me."

He snapped and looked around once again.

"Sorry…Amia…"

Mumbling. She stared at him with an annoyed look. To hear him mumble annoyed her more than hear him screaming.

"You don't recognize it, do you?" She stopped as if to let him answer, but he didn't. "You don't recognize me, do you?"

"I was…expecting someone else."

"I've heard that too many times already"

"Yea – Wait what?"

"I've received more Morgens, more kids like you. They all end up just as disappointed as you." She held her brush firmly and continued painting. "Though… you are the first who is not dead." She continued.

He lifted his head and looked at her before turning again at the three painted walls.

"No…I don't recognize the images. What are they supposed to be?"

A tiny smile appeared on her face. "It's our story" her arm extended over his head and her boney fingers pointed at the wall to their left. From the corner he could see a finely painted forest landscape. Two trolls, one purple blooded and the other jade blooded, fought over a lusus. The green one defending, the purple one attacking.

"That's how we met, remember."

"Yes. You…you were a pain!" Amia had attacked his lusus that time. They had hatched just a few weeks before that and she was already trying to cull someone's lusus. She smiled again.

"But…" He looked around and tried to figure out the story again but the events had no significance, no relation to his life. "I don't…know. I don't remember anything else"

"That's because it's a different timeline."

He turned around and squinted. He knew there were alternate doomed timelines, but it was the first time he ever encountered someone so…old.

"It's different" she continued "because we never played Sgrub."

A shiver went down his spine.

"How? – What?"

"In my timeline there was no apocalypse. Therefore we never needed to play it to save ourselves."

"WAIT WAIT WAIT! How do you even know of Sgrub if you have never played it!?"

"Is that what really concerns you?" she stood up and left the fourth wall unfinished. "I've heard it all from your other dead selves. They all grumble about a bunch of "what if's" asking themselves if it was worth it, if the game really did something good, if there was any other way around it, or if they should've left their moirails behind. Now you, the only Morgen that survived, ask me how I even know about the game."

"I do want to know…" he rubbed his arm and stood up. His feet dragged him right beside her in the corner of the wall, where the story began. "but I…I don't know if I will like the whole story."

"You won't know until you hear it."

"Alright."


End file.
